Wells Fargo & Co. may have opened as many as 3.5 million fraudulent accounts in the last 15 years, according to consumers who are trying to beef up a settlement with the bank over abusive sales practices.
The bank reached a $110 million deal in late March to resolve a national class-action lawsuit over claims that employees may have opened more than 2 million deposit and credit-card accounts without customers’ permission since 2011. After the bank last month agreed to expand the accord to include dates as early as May 2002, lawyers for consumers on Thursday raised their estimate on the number of fake accounts.
